30 May 2015

Ruminations – 30may15 (updated 2jun15)

George Rebane

Lowell Robinson RIP. A sad email from a friend this morning reported the passing last night of Lowell Robinson, one of the giants of our community. Lowell was the founder of what today we know as Robinson Enterprises, a multi-faceted business that has served Nevada County for decades. He also put his money where his mouth was as a prominent supporter of uncounted philanthropies, local educational programs, and political causes. We will miss his good humor, wisdom, and generosity.

IQ scores have been rising for decades. So we learn from the work of James Flynn, a social scientist at the University of Otago in New Zealand. Since IQ is a relative or a ‘normed measure’ of intelligence represented by the bell curve in which 100 is set so as to indicate the average or mean IQ, and every ten point difference from 100 is one standard deviation, your 80 or 120 IQ respectively says that about 2.5% of the population scores lower than you, or the same percentage scores higher. But Dr Flynn reports that IQ tests have had to be made tougher over the course of the last century in order to keep the mean at 100.

IQ scores shot up in the 1920s after WW1, then plateaued, and then shot up again after WW2. Scores plateaued again in the 1970s (coincident with when Great Society education started kicking in). After picking up for a quarter century, the recent rise has again slowed down. One of the several theories to account for this ‘Flynn Effect’ is that childhoods have become longer as countries became richer during the last hundred years or so.

Several people are beginning to notice Jonathan Rauch’s (Political Realism, 2015) development of what he has labeled “transactional politics”. The left-leaning political commentator sounds almost like a conservative when he defends ‘political machines’ as the grease that keeps the wheels of government turning, and not grinding to a halt as seems to be the current propensity of Washington. He observes that “American government may be less corrupt. But it also has more difficulty getting anything done.” One of his nostrums includes reinstatement of ‘earmarks’ as the currency which allowed (motivated?) politicians to wheel and deal and then compromise in getting major legislation through Congress. I’ll have more to say about Rauch’s thoughts in a future post on our government’s sclerotic corruption, a dysfunction that is now beyond the tipping point as also analyzed by Charles Murray (By the People, 2015).

The success of our sandboxes in promoting conversation on divers topics seems assured given the length of their comment streams, each containing multiple threads between various commenters who enter and leave topics as their interest varies. The sandboxes are also sites for the inevitable interpersonal dust devils that rise and fall when commenters begin to dissect each other’s ideological deficiencies, and then attribute these to more seminal shortcomings that need to be identified and exposed. From the evident enthusiasm and duration of these eruptions, one may conclude that they serve some purpose and provide participants a measure of relief, no matter how fleeting. But I’m still convinced that readers would rather encounter some new observation or insight about our life and times rather than wading through the next exchange of snark on snark.

[31may15 update] The federal mental midgets can't make up their minds about climate change aka global warming aka AGW. Out of one side (Dept of Commerce) of the administration come laments that our economy continued to skooch along on its butt during 1Q15 because of an unusually cold and severe winter, and from the other side (NOAA) we are assured that the past winter was the warmest on record. But the real tragedy is that our electorate is way too far gone to even understand such blatant contradictions - both reports make a lot of sense to such folks in how they interpret the world around them.

[1jun15 update]Union columnist George Boardman, who often comments on these pages, laments today about people picking and choosing “the science they want to believe” as if there was something wrong or ignorant about that. Not being a scientist, he assumes that ‘science’ speaks with one voice. It is not clear what he thinks is the voice of science, but it seems to issue from either an assumed ‘consensus’ of scientists, or at least a plurality of such people. In his column Mr Boardman uses public attitudes toward genetically modified foods, vaccination, and, of course, man-made (anthropogenic) global warming. For him the revealed scientific truth is GMOs are good, vaccines are good, and AGW is an existential threat to mankind.

He is amazed that people are still “selective” and choose to believe some of these things while rejecting others, since all this science comes from “precisely the same organizations that most of us trust”. Well that’s not even approximately correct, because the UN’s IPCC promoting (a recently qualified view of) AGW is not even an organization per se, and does not deal with medicines or advanced agricultural products. But his article (here) sounds authoritative, speaks of a pedestal-mounted science, and cites economists on human rationality - so what is the poor innumerate layman to do in light of Mr Boardman’s obvious admonition to listen and accept the one booming voice of science? From his presentation it is clear that in such cases one should not look behind the curtain, for God only knows what will be found there.

(BTW, the author is also not familiar with when economists began “finally embracing the idea that people don’t make rational decisions when it comes to money.” Actually, Kahneman and Tversky showed as early as the mid-1970s that people’s rationality about money and many other things is in short supply. How else can one explain the electorate’s continual acceptance of prevaricating and pernicious politicians?)

This is not the place to rehash the global debate about climate science and AGW skepticism, nor even the rationality of the electorate. Both topics have received extensive coverage in these pages over the years, and the arguments can be either googled or obtained by directly searching RR.

[2jun15 update] Jade Helm preparations are proceeding apace across our land. These widespread counter insurgency exercises are scheduled for this July and August. Local jurisdictions and LEO organizations are being quietly briefed on their considerable roles and requirements for co-operation with the participating troops. The lamestream reports don't tie with what is planned. Please read this report and view the video (here) of the recent briefing to the county council in Big Springs, TX, then ask your congressman what this is all about. (H/T to reader)

Comments

Prayers to his family and RIP to a great man. Enjoyed his company last at the Republican spring dinner which was dedicated to him and celebrated his life and achievements. He was honored with proclamations from both Congressmen as well as our State senator and assemblymen.

Lowell Robinson was a community pillar that will be missed. I interviewed him several times on economic issues and found his insight to be very helpful in understanding the core of an issue, especially transportation, timber and environmental issues. We will all miss his wisdom and insight.

Walt...It's wonderful to have been born and raised here. Lowell was a couple of years older, and his brother Neil was in my class. Husband Mel is a little older than Lowell. We were in the trucking business and hauled all kinds of things, but mostly logs for over 40 years and then bought a Woodmizer sawmill and milled lumber for another 15 years. One of our sons has worked for Robinson many years. They're good, down to earth people who know how to get things done.

George, just want you to know your sandbox and other discussions are wonderful compared to some I've noted elsewhere. We're very fortunate you put forth the effort. The result is greater understanding about many things. Thank you

BonnieM 601am - Thank you for the kind and appreciative words Bonnie. No matter how different are our views of the world and what is happening in America, we do need a place to make our points and explain ourselves. Agreement is not required for understanding each other. And those undeclared, uncommitted, unsure, or hewing to some muddled middle may benefit from seeing the stark differences that now polarize our country.

I echo Bonnie's words here and thank George for the opportunity to debate, smackdown and get smacked down by words! I noticed today that MA and SF are now over at the CABPRO Reports spewing their dogma. Those two are, along with the Emery's, a good example of clueless people.

Just for the record, there is indeed a 'Godwin forfeit' (Gregory 1136am) that derives from Godwin's Law - "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1."

So let me understand. Frisch calls people Nazi's and then claims a article about how bad the Nazi's are is something bad? Jeeze, liberals are just stupid. And Gregory is correct, Frisch (the Truckee troll) loses again.

The classic statement of Godwin's law of Nazi Analogies is that the one who brings up the Nazis is the one who automatically loses, and Frisch's out of the blue that labels the current CABPRO as neo-Nazi qualifies both in a Godwin context and, arguably, defamation, something Frisch has shown no small talent for.

I expect CABPRO will always have a special place in Frisch's black heart for being central in thwarting the wretchedly misnamed Sierra Business Council's NH2020 initiative. I have never been a CABPRO supporter but they did a nice job helping to get us out from under that one.

You are correct Gregory. CABPRO under Margaret Urke's leadership back then did defeat Frisch's attempt to destroy the people's private property rights and allow the government to come on that property without a warrant to search for "flora and fauna" they thought was important. Yes, Frisch is what I would call a true supporter of fascism since he pounded his chest and did forums for NH2020 as I recall. Drew Bedwell saved the citizens of Nevada County from people like Frisch and the Gang of Four.

It's amazing. When Pres. Bush senior told us we were going into a new One World government that wouldn't be Communist nor Capitalist I wondered why he didn't mention Socialist like the German National Socialists (Nazi's) since we seemed to be following their pattern. Before Hitler was elected Germany even had its "Back to the Earth" green environmental movement....hence the well taken care of Black Forrest everyone used to admire. It's not only amazing, but almost funny that so many don't remember and therefore don't realize we're repeating what we condemned.

I went to the State and reviewed the Sierra Business Council's last 990 which was 2013. After a review I determined it is operated along the lines as the Clinton Foundation. Wow! The libs really know how to use a 501 c3 for a make work organization and are all very creative in their "expenses" for travel and other things. I would suggest these "non-profits" should be reviewed as closely as the IRS has the Tea Party requests. Mu goodness no wonder there is a 18 trillion dollar deficit. All the freeloading going on is breathtaking!

Point to ponder - Out of a $3.5T federal budget the government awards about $500B annually to for-profit companies for such things as defense systems, road building/repair, office supplies, transportation, food, fuel, ... . It also awards about $700B in grants, etc to non-profits.

I reviewed the Department of Agriculture's budget and way down in the bowels are all the "grants" it gives to non-profits. Billions of dollars! If one reviews all the Executive departments it is revealed they all have these slush funds they send money to their pals in the eco and liberal business models. I have asked many times over the years for a review and explanation of why the taxpayers are being fleeced. No answers, no changes to the scams.

In today's The Union, George Boardman has indeed chosen argumentum ad verecundiam over scientific argument, with a side of pickled red herring in a tobacco sauce as a distraction. On the web it isn't as yet included in the Columns section but it is in the middle of the editorial page in the ePaper edition.

George, I know your'e out there, here's a tidbit from James Lovelock, of Gaia fame, one of the demigods of the environmental movement:

The great climate science centres around the world are more than well aware how weak their science is. If you talk to them privately they're scared stiff of the fact that they don't really know what the clouds and the aerosols are doing. They could be absolutely running the show. We haven't got the physics worked out yet. One of the chiefs once said to me that he agreed that they should include the biology in their models, but he said they hadn't got the physics right yet and it would be five years before they do. So why on earth are the politicians spending a fortune of our money when we can least afford it on doing things to prevent events 50 years from now? They've employed scientists to tell them what they want to hear...

We do need scepticism about the predictions about what will happen to the climate in 50 years, or whatever. It's almost naive, scientifically speaking, to think we can give relatively accurate predictions for future climate. There are so many unknowns that it's wrong to do it.

In the five years since Lovelock said that to The Guardian, the science behind clouds and aerosols being a missing piece of the climate puzzle has only gotten stronger. I became aware of the issues of variable albedo (reflectiveness) of the Earth as a result of other factors in early 2007 and there is a 540 million year record of the ocean temperatures varying in lockstep with the galactic cosmic ray flux our solar system is bathed in. GCR's role in creating cloud condensation nuclei has been also established in a major ongoing experiment at CERN, CLOUD (Cosmics Leaving OUtdoor Droplets). The co-author of the paper I thought was most impactful, "Celestial driver of Phanerozoic climate?", astrophysicist Nir Shaviv, was at the time a fairly obscure assistant professor of physics in Jerusalem but is now a full professor and has spent the last year at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies as an IBM Einstein Fellow, a nice way to spend a vacation away from students.

George Boardman, it's clear you don't read the science yourself, find yourself a copy of "The Chilling Stars", authored by the late Philip Calder (a science writer) with Henrik Svensmark, a Danish physicist who found himself a target of the climate cabal when he published on an interesting correlation of cloudiness with cosmic ray incidence. If you're capable of reading articles in Scientific American, a Svensmark paper, "Cosmoclimatology" was in Astronomy & Geophysics in early 2007. I'd suggest reading Scientific American on the subject but they drank the CO2 Koolaid a long time ago.

GeorgeB's column was another foolish attempt to discredit those who argue the science is unsettled. I would like him to do an indepth article on how much money the taxpaters have spent through grants to "scientists" and government agencies trying to prove the computer models are right. But as we know, the computer models have been tweaked numerous times to get the results the AGW crowd wants. Vaclav Klaus said it best, AGW is political not science. But GeorgeB has drunk the koolaid.

If you don't have a WSJ sub and don't know how to retrieve a paywalled WSJ article without the sub, try the library, it's the Sept 19 2014 issue. Steven Koonin, purer than Caesar's wife in the world of physics, was appointed by the American Physical Society's climate statement crafted after the IPCC flag was raised in 2006 and the world's scientific societies were pushed to salute it. In the APS' case, the top officers (none of whom had any expertise in climate) drafted the statement in private at a jolly nice lunch and they apparently appointed Koonin because all those deniers would have to believe him, but Koonin didn't come to the answer the APS officers wanted, and so the statement remains untouched a year and a half after the review began, long after, under APS rules, statements are to be reviewed,

The WSJ piece was apparently written and published after the APS stalemate was clear... in effect, Koonin's resignation from the statement review.

Gregory, I didn't get into the science, I leave that too you. I do the politics which is more my forte'. Klaus confirmed what I wrote about the politics in 1997 when all this crapola started. It is a way to imprison people in a dogma of lies to gain their money and enslave. All very simple. I will argue on the politics and leave the science to those who think that is what it is all about.

Todd, scarequoting "scientists" is making a scientific judgment you'd best leave on the table, as is claiming they are tweaking the models based on what the AGW crowd wants, as if they were just doing their duty.

There's a long history in science of scientists often unconsciously tweaking results in favor of what they just *know* is the reality. As Richard Feynman said in an address to CalTech graduates, "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool."

Todd...Good observations on your part. I don't care if it's science, religion, medicine...whatever. If it's a group there's politics involved. Those who want to rule and those looking for special favors. Add money, and it's a done deal. There's real science that admits it doesn't have all the answers, and paid science that claims to know it all.

All this is politics and the AGW promoters are simply those that want to control. Just look at our state. The real reason all this AB32 crapola is in place can be seen in the rules and regulations we now have to bow to and to the billions in the bank of California, looking for someone to spend it. California is the poster child on what AGW really is all about.

In Mr Boardman's favor, I don't think that he has destroyed his credibility, except, perhaps, with those of his readers who are indiscriminately credulous. His more discriminating audience knows his credentials in interpreting the veracity of things scientific, and therefore saw his column to be a commentary of his opinions that it clearly was. We here take him to task not for his (lack of) scientific knowledge, but for how he views reports from science and then interprets them.

All scientific knowledge is constantly under revision, it's a work in progress. Even lay people quickly become aware of this as they read in the popular press a constant litany of changes and revisions in the prescriptions and prognostications from science that impact our diets, exercise, psychological wellbeing, first response to trauma, etc. No one with any understanding of science has 'settled science' in their lexicon.

GeorgeB falls into the category of "duped" in my opinion. That doesn't make him a bed person, just not too informed. I look at the language=ge for a lot of my proof about somethings veracity. Orwell was correct that changing a words meaning or definition is very telling. AGW is a prime example.

OK,, lets hear what the nay saying Lefties have to say.
I put nothing past "O" and Co.at this point. The FEDS saw what can go down at the Ted Bundy Ranch, and now may be acting accordingly. " We have rednecks with guns who know how to use them".

Well, call them what you will, but they do resemble Nazi Youth. And they called my buddies in the Lone Star State looney tunes for noticing that a few Wal-marts had closed for plumbing repairs as Homeland Security vehicles were amassing behind the stores, not in the front parking lot. Boy, what are military vehicles doing there hiding in the back?? I bet they were fixing the plumbing along with FEMA Corps.

I'm concerned, but not worried. Worry doesn't do a bit of good about anything. I'm certainly not too surprised. This nation is headed for financial collapse of some sort. Have no idea when, but the trajectory only points one way. We continue to fall further into debt with no plan whatever to stop. What do people think will happen? It's the same story around the world, so all it will take is some financial hicup in a far off land to bring the whole pile down. Even with rigid wage and price controls, folks will realize the money's no good and there will be massive shortages of needed items. Around about then the word will get out that certain areas (large urban populations) have plenty and the more rural outlying areas are being starved. It's not really evil - it's just that if you only have so much, you prioritize your resources to the most in the smallest areas. Most of the power structure lives in these areas and they don't want rioting a few blocks away. This training seems to be pointed at subduing the uppity country yokels.
Might be in my lifetime - might not. There appears to be nothing I can do about it since I'm in a tiny minority. I'm not going to beat my head against a wall. I can suggest folks read books like 'The Envoy'.
You get a very vivid view of 'civilization' with a few supports kicked away. Humans are hardly far from animals when a few societal norms are removed.